Assassination
by the stargate time traveller
Summary: A more realistic take on the James Bond franchise. James and another 00 agent are sent to assassinate a really dangerous man. Merry Christmas.


Despite some of his colleagues views about him and his reputation James Bond hated parties. He hated them because as a spy he preferred slipping into places unseen. He didn't mind slipping into offices representing faked businesses, that was work. As an MI6 agent and long term spy, Bond took pride in his work, but his hatred of parties was simply because of how they affected him. Parties just made him uncomfortable because he couldn't see people for who they were, and because he needed to act a certain way beyond the persona he would craft for the occasion. On a mission Bond could be counted on to act in a certain manner, it was something that came natural to him.

But at parties he had to smile and make idle chit chat to people who weren't even involved with the mission. The ironic thing was Bond did it so well. He stood straight and looked around as casually as he did before nodding at his partner beside him. "There he is," Bond whispered, glancing at 005. It was not unusual for him to work with other MI6 agents, it was just rare. "How do you want to do this?" she asked. James had worked with female agents before, and contrary to some speculation of the number of women he'd had in his life, he actually respected them and treated them like friends. Even when they parted he made sure it was always amicable and that they understood. It worked for most of them, but Katie Parks had only recently been promoted to 00 status, and so this was a very important mission for her.

James thought the young woman was good, she was beautiful with her long dark hair, blue eyes and moon face with a body that was strongly athletic, though he knew that that same body hid an agent with over 7 years expertise in counterintelligence. Like James she was armed, though with a smaller and lighter sidearm compared to the Walther PPK Bond had under his jacket. Katie, like many other agents, had military experience, though unlike James hers was in the Royal Air Force. She'd once been a combat pilot giving her a good knowledge of combat, though she had piloted a few spy planes in her heyday until she'd applied for a posting in military intelligence. She'd had worked hard through MI5 and became an expert in countering spying operations into the United Kingdom before deciding it was time for her to make her mark into MI6. James had been impressed with her stance - by joining MI5 she had wanted to see if the life of the spy was the type of life she wanted, and it was a good way of doing it. She was also determined to get a decent report from 007 who'd then hand it over to M. You didn't just become a 00 agent and expect to be handed a mission. There was still a period of suitability, the right mindset, how the agent worked with others in the field, how they dealt with pressure. So far Katie had impressed her superiors with her skills and cool mind, but that had only been on the small missions she'd been handed. This was the field and completely different. As the recent holder of 007 James had trained only a handful of agents, but it had to be done. He needed to do his fair share, even if he was reluctant to hold new agents hands where something, anything, could go wrong. But he'd been in the job for a long time now, and he'd come to realise that the senior agent he'd been palmed off with had probably thought along the same lines about him when he'd become a 00.

"Silently," James replied to Katie's question. "Lets blend in, mingle with the crowd. The more they see us, the less suspicious. We've got plenty of time." Katie nodded and walked with James into the crowd. "I'll say one thing for Kilmer," Katie remarked as she lightly sipped the champagne she'd taken from a server though she only took light sips from the flute to make sure she didn't drink too much and become intoxicated. "He's certainly splurging on entertaining his guests." James nodded, "Most people like him always do. I wonder how many of them know where he really gets some of his fortune." Sharing an unspoken message, James led the other agent into the crowd where they 'greeted old friends' in the people they met, but by the time they'd turned their backs they ignored the people asking their neighbors "who was that?" Any onlooker wouldn't really hear them, and even if they did they'd probably assume the other had simply forgotten them. James had once been worried about things like that, another reason he had come to dislike parties, now he simply did not care. The point was the two 00s were always on the move. But that didn't mean they weren't thinking over James's words, did these people know anything about their host? Otto Kilmer was a businessman and a philanthropist on the outside, and he was regularly seen on the television or in the papers, usually making a massive donation to various charities. There were pictures of him kneeling down next to children, holding people's hands, and so on. When James had been selected for this assignment and had gone over the rather hefty file MI6 had on the man, knowing what he really was, he had wondered whether or not these people would even want to accept the money if they knew where it had actually come from. He owned a number of businesses, some of which he'd purchased or made bids on when they looked like they were about to go under, though many intelligence agencies around the Earth had evidence of industrial espionage, but that kind of spying was ignored by the agencies. It was only threats that garnered their attention, and unfortunately for Otto Kilmer he registered a threat. He was believed to be personally responsible for arranging the quiet assassinations of numerous people, many of them potential future business rivals. In that case he was simply covering his tracks and making sure he remained on top form, Bond could understand and even appreciate that in some way.

But Kilmer sponsored some of the worst people imaginable. It wasn't very well known, but Kilmer had once been a spy for the German secret service before he'd left, changed his name, killed some of the operatives he'd known, and simply disappeared only to reappear as Otto Kilmer. His real name was lost to time though if some of them didn't know who he was really James would be surprised, but the Germans remembered him. So did MI5 and MI6 since the man had run a small business where he'd pass off some of Britain and Germany's secrets to other nations for the highest bidder. That money he had raised had gone into his first businesses before selling up and making a lot of money before making and buying newer businesses. He'd done that under an alias before Otto Kilmer became his new name, and several counterintelligence operations went pear shaped because of him, and in the confused mess that followed he'd vanished again and to Bond's knowledge the man hadn't tried the same trick again for some time, but he couldn't know for sure. Still that didn't mean Kilmer wasn't dangerous. For example three years ago a consignment of a new type of machine gun was smuggled into the hands of a nascent terrorist cell before the CIA caught hold of them, and put the cell out of operation permanently. Until recently no-one had any idea where the weaponry had come from, but they did now. MI6 had been investigating Kilmer for a while to build an actual case against him, and they'd sent dozens of operatives undercover to piece together as much as they could. They'd been sent to various businesses the man owned, and they had found a lot of incriminating evidence that could see him thrown into prison. It wasn't enough to see him assassinated despite MI6 wanting a reason to kill him for the number of terrorist and drug businesses he was rumored to be supplying. But then it came. An MI6 agent busy investigating one of Kilmer's businesses found a machine gun that was the exact same design as the one found by the CIA.

But M had wanted more proof and had the agents look for it, and they found it. Bizarrely one of Kilmer's businesses happened to be a simple ice cream firm in London, and there were three others in Manchester, Paris, Berlin, and several other cities. In each of them was a sealed room labelled "Research Laboratory" and no-one barring a few were allowed inside these labs. Now, if Bond had been one of the agents assigned to look into the business side of Otto Kilmer's life, he would've been instantly suspicious given what he'd heard about the man. Thankfully one of the agents had had the necessary common sense to bother to look into the history of the lab to see if anything - a new flavored ice cream cone, or a new and sweeter variety you could get in a tub for instance - had been produced. The agent had found nothing. No new flavors or new types of ice cream had been produced in all the time the labs had been established, and another red flag had gone up. When the information had been circulated to MI6 the agents had looked into it, and found chemicals a normal ice cream plant would never have, but someone developing Crystal Meth would. The agents were told to break into the labs and take snapshots whenever possible. It wasn't just Crystal Meth the so called research labs were making, but other common drugs like LSD, cocaine, smack, weed, pot and several others. It was clever, really in a very sick way - the factories would produce the drugs and then distribute them to dealers throughout the cities where a Kilmer owned ice cream factory was in, and rake in the profits which funded Kilmer perfectly. True, it might be small the amount of profit but it was a sizable trickle. But that was only a small part to what he did. There were other red flags being raised; it seemed the discovery of the machine gun which had been purely accidental though accepted since Kilmer ran a gun manufacturing business and had the specs of the gun had only sent the dominos falling, like the manufacturing of aircraft in secret. Kilmer had found an aircraft design which was incredibly sophisticated, modeled on drone technology in some areas, and he'd spent the last three years improving and then mass producing them though some of the more advanced technology and equipment they needed to work properly hadn't been installed yet. They were manufactured and then hidden before being moved in bulk through third parties in other countries. It was a clever scheme, one MI6 and the CIA were taking great pains to stop, especially since no-one knew where exactly the aircraft were being sent. Dozens of agents were undercover risking their lives, pressing leads and connections trying to learn where the planes were. There were other things of course which were going a long way into proving Otto Kilmer's guilt. Everyday more and more proof of the man's wrongdoings were coming to light, but for right now MI6 just wanted him dead whilst other agents took care of the other members of his organisation before they could step up to fill the vacuum Kilmer would leave behind in his wake. That was why he and Katie were here.

007 007

As Bond stood watching the crowd casually, one hand in his pocket as he smiled and chatted a little with some of the ladies as he tried to blend in, Katie was trying to do the same thing whilst working out what way was the best to kill Otto Kilmer. She felt the best way of killing him would be through poison. But the only problem she had was how they'd kill him. After about 7 minutes of idle chitchat with the different guests the two MI6 agents decided to act. Silently they slipped through the crowd and up the stairs to Kilmer's room. It only took them a few minutes to find the right one, but when they found the computer Katie headed for it, pulling out a wireless transmitter. It would download the entire database and transmit it to a waiting team who'd also get Katie and Bond away. It also helped to hack into the computer, and after a minute of work Katie was inside the computer whilst James was standing by the door, keeping half his vision on the corridor, the other at Katie as she worked. It took a few minutes but when he saw her grin of triumph. She was in, and from her smile it was nothing but good news - for them.

"Transmitting, now," she whispered happily - James knew she was happy because their mission was going to succeed, before pressing the small button that would transmit - low tech, but really effective. James nodded, then stiffened. "I think someone's coming up the stairs," he whispered, both eyes now firmly fixed on the corridor through the narrow gap. "I was wondering how we're going to do it," Katie's whisper made him glance back in her direction before returning his gaze towards the corridors. "How are we going to kill him? With poison, yeah, got that. But how?"

"I have an idea, can we leave this room or not?"

"Almost. Just 30 seconds to go, and we've got enough." The guard was just coming up the stairs to go to the toilet and get down again before he was noticed missing. He'd already spent enough time indulging, privately behind his boss's back, in the drinks and the food and now he was paying for it. He only hoped his boss and wife didn't find out, and he wasn't sure which was the worst option. His wife would scream her head off at him, his boss might just kill him, literally. He poked his head through different rooms trying to find a decent bathroom - the guards were meant to be on the ground floor, just for tonight before being moved onto their next job - so he didn't know for sure where it was. But he hoped he could find one before a, he had an embarrassing accident before he could relieve himself, and would mean he couldn't get downstairs, where his absence would be noticed and noted down, meaning no pay. And b, Otto Kilmer found him up here, if that happened then he would need to find a good undertaker. He had poked his head in different rooms without much luck, and he was about to open another door when a tall man followed by a woman, swaying and laughing. They looked mussed up, the man had lipstick around his lips, and the woman's bun had come loose, and strands of hair were draped messily around her shoulders. The guard could smell the booze on them in their breath, on their clothes... Partygoers, perfectly normal, perfectly drunk as well. He didn't suspect anything. Oh god, he suddenly thought as he felt his bowels shift uncomfortably, and surged into the room the couple had just come from in the hopes the answer to his prayers would be inside. There wasn't a toilet. Meanwhile James and Katie had made it downstairs, laughing and swaying gently. Few people took note of them, though one or two looked scandalised at their behavior, though not many since the party was nothing formal. Quite a few couples were drunk already, some of them even becoming a bit too handsy with partners. He may have been acting drunk, but James's mind was on what Katie had been saying to him upstairs, and he knew she had a point. He'd found Otto already, he was surrounded by an entourage and James was willing to bet that the majority were simply bodyguards. Using a gun wouldn't work, there were too many people around; some were probably drunk already or on their way to approaching drunk, but there was no guarantee they wouldn't remember anything. Poison was the best option, and Katie had already come to that conclusion, but James had been wondering how they could complete their mission long before he'd even walked through the door. He cursed Kilmer for having so many bodyguards. While he was debating with himself how to kill the man who was responsible for drugs and guns, James multitasked by dancing with Katie. He had to give her some credit, she was acting the part of drunken woman at a party but he could see in her eyes the sharpness of her personality. He leaned in close, biting her skin to get the right reaction. "Play along," he ordered quietly. "Lets see if we can get close to Kilmer without being noticed. Maybe we can find a way to kill him before his guards see us." Katie nodded and let loose a rather good airheaded giggle before she whispered in her usual mindful tone. "Poison?"

"We'll see when we get there," James replied. As the two MI6 agents headed towards the corrupt industrialist, they barely kept an eye on the crowd of partygoers, and that was a mistake. Katie was just twisting in James's arms when her right eye caught something. "James," she whispered urgently, turning him around casually so he could see what she'd just spotted. "Look, that Chinese man." It took James a second to spot him after Katie had pointed him out. The Chinese man was standing out of sight of just about everyone in the room, ignored by everyone, and he was standing just behind a guard which put him out of notice of the armed heavies. In his hands was a small handgun with a silencer and a sight. He was aiming it at Kilmer, and before James or Katie could do anything - not that they'd have wanted to since killing Kilmer was their mission - the Chinese assassin fired. He put three bullets into Kilmer - one through the temple, the other two through the chest. Otto Kilmer was very, very dead. As the more sober partygoers screamed as the industrialist's body collapsed to the ground like a marionette whose string had been sliced through, a look of pain on his otherwise smiling face which made the image more gruesome, the assassin ran out of the ballroom with a number of guards chasing him. James looked at Katie grimly before ushering her out of the room.

007 007

"Is this the man 007?" Tanner asked passing a file over to James a few days later when he and Katie had returned to London. They were inside M's office, with Q and Tanner flanking the head of MI6, though Tanner was doing most of the talking at this stage. James took it and looked at the face in the photo and nodded. It was the same man. He fast read the file and learnt the assassin's name was Lao Chung of the Chinese Secret Service. He was actually considered one of the People's republic's top spies and assassins, which was his speciality. "Yes," he replied. "So, the Chinese kill Kilmer without taking anything from the computer? That doesn't make any sense." "Oh, it does," M said from her seat before she leaned forwards, her wrinkled face set in a stony frown. "The Chinese and the Americans are conducting their own investigations into Kilmer's businesses, well I should say they were now he's dead. They were obviously satisfied with their investigations, which we don't know how advanced they were. It's possible and maybe likely they downloaded data from Kilmer's computer before we got to it, and they decided to kill him." Ah yes. The computer download. James sighed. "How much have we learnt?" Now a technical question had been asked Q stepped forwards. "Kilmer didn't encrypt his computer, 007. He hadn't even linked it to the internet which means he downloaded and uploaded information to his colleagues via a different computer." James nodded in understanding. "So he was trying to minimise the amount of internet surveillance by simply not encrypting his computer, which he knows someone brighter than him can hack?"

"Precisely. And answering your question there is a lot on that computer copy you and 005 brought back to us. With that knowledge we can put an end to Kilmer's businesses, and there were quite a few others that we didn't even know about. Or even suspect." That raised a red flag with Bond. "I thought we'd done a thorough job with Kilmer's businesses, and we had agents going over his finances, his investments and everything he was doing in those laboratories. How could we miss them?" Q shrugged to show he didn't know, well that was how it would appear to someone who didn't know the basic rules of espionage, but James had learnt many times over the years to tell when someone wasn't telling the whole truth, and that only someone of M's clearance was allowed access to the information. He shrugged himself, making his body language as accepting of the statement as he could out of sheer practice. While he was curious about what else Kilmer had had up his sleeves, he wasn't going to worry about it. With Kilmer dead another threat to world peace was gone, but he knew another would appear. Threats like that were like the Greek Hydra,


End file.
